Page 7 of Savagely Scarred

“Oh no! You can’t pull that for this one!”

“Sure I can.” She grins wickedly. “You owe me.”

The room is dead silent for a minute while she stares at me intensely. She’s not even blinking. I grind my teeth together and narrow my eyes at her.

“I’ll think about it.”

“Fabulous!” she squeals and snaps out of our staring contest. She claps her hands together. “Time for presents?”

I can feel Sage’s eyes boring into the side of my head. He may let this go for now while everyone else is here, but I know that this conversation, is in fact…not over.

Grateful for the change in subject, I pluck up the envelope that had been laying on the table among the food spread all evening. I reach across the table and hand it to Ava. Enzo delicately takes it from her—a knife appearing in his other hand. He flicks the blade open, cuts it open for her and holds it back out to her.

“Thank you,” she says timidly while slowly taking it from him and pulling out the card.

“It’s a collective gift. We all thought you could really use a break since you’ve been working so hard between both jobs.”

Her fingers tremble as she reads the gift certificate to the most luxurious spa retreat around. We booked her an entire weekend of pampering. Tears roll down her cheeks, and she swipes them away when she looks up at all of us.

“You guys, this is so sweet of you, but I don’t know if I’ll be able to get off work for it. I was lucky enough to get someone to cover my shifts for these two Saturdays.”

“If Hank has a problem with it, we will pay him a visit. I’m sure he’s doing something illegal we can threaten him with,” Enzo offers.

“And you wouldn’t even be working at the bar if Anna hadn’t taken away your promotion,” I say heavily with guilt.

She sniffs and forces out a laugh before looking into my eyes. “Yes, because apparently your best friend being kidnapped for two days is not a good enough reason to miss work.”

Anna is such a raging, egotistical bitch. But at least she didn’t fire Ava. I think she felt guilty about the whole thing after everything had been released to the press. Anna of course couldn’t show weakness to the other staff by taking it back and giving her the promotion. She did, however, give her another chance for the Gala this year.

The conversation and banter continued for another hour before we all decided to call it a night. Sage took the guys to show them his latest piece of gym equipment before they left, while Ava helped me pack up the food and put it away.

“You know the offer still stands to stay here,” I remind her as I slide the last item into the fridge and close the door.

Ava pauses wiping up the island counter, “And ruin your newfound domesticated happiness? No, thank you.”

“Ava. We have two spare bedrooms, and you’d have your own bathroom. You could finally make a grand exit at the bar if you didn’t have to worry about rent.”

She shakes her head and throws the rag into the sink. “I do not want to live somewhere where I have to question whether or not a surface has been fucked on.”

I smile and nod my head. “Touché. What about Enzo? Didn’t he offer too?”

“That is a street I do not want to go down right now.”

“Come on! You still haven’t told me what happened between you two.”

“Nothing to tell, because nothing happened. He wants a relationship and I don’t. I have moved on. Living with him would be a nightmare because he wouldn’t stop pursuing me.”

Her phone dings and she frowns while she reads her screen.

“What’s wrong?”

“Just a birthday text.” She quickly turns her screen off and sets her phone down. I give her a questioning look. “Someone I didn’t expect to hear from. That’s all.”

I don’t say a word in reply. Ava has skeletons from her past that even I don’t know about. There are some parts she refuses to talk about, and I respect her enough not to ask.

“Ready to go?” Enzo leans on the doorframe and runs his fingers through his brown hair.

“Yeah.”